Rainforestinn's B&B Blog -- El Yunque, Puerto Rico

YouTube Videos aren't Always Videos

There are so many ways to promote your bed and breakfast using videos. Tripadvisor has a section where you can upload them.  Many of the paid directories also have video sections. Don't discount your section on youtube. We have the rainforestinn channel and some of our videos there have thousands of downloads (they were made by friends who have cameras). But to make a video you need know-how, technical lighting and gaffer tools, sound equipment, video editing software, Camera tripods and a camera. Since we don't have a video camera we didn't even have to worry about all the other knowledge and equipment we also didn't have.

Last month we started managing a  new vacation rental in El Yunque. It's a large estate home on the same hill (five acres over) as our bed and breakfast. A video walk through of "Villa Hermosa" would have been an excellent promotion tool. But we don't have a video camera. After a couple of days feeling morose and depressed about the inability to make a video I did some searching on the internet and found out about Animoto. This is an internet based service that makes high production value motion graphics synchronized to every beat of your music. Animoto's service is hard it describe.

In about ten minutes you can make a video from your photographs (either upload them or use ones you already have on flickr). Their web based software synchronizes the pictures to the music which you select. There is a video on their website which explains the service (more better as we say here in the Caribbean). They also have lots of music to choose from on their website but I recommend you go to the podsafe music network to find some better music which matches your video exactly.  You can buy music there (very cheaply) and legally use it in your podcasts (both video and sound) as long as it is not a commercial production and as long as you give the artist credit. There are also other sources for the music of independent artists that you can use. It takes some time to find a song that will be perfect for your video but it's fun.

Obviously you can't use anything owned by a major music label or they will come to your house, fine you $25,000 dollars and take away your computer. I imagine (when it happens) that you're descended on by men in black suits driving cargo vans and all just because you wanted to use "Thriller" as the background in your inn's video. Seriously though, the amount of independent music available is incredible and so much of it is such amazing high quality stuff.

Faux Vegetarianism

There are so many different kinds of vegetarians that sometimes I get confused. We serve a vegetarian breakfast here at the rainforestinn so we are conscious of vegetarianism. And I certainly understand the animal rights argument. Using animals for making your shoes, belts and fancy designer purses is clearly a violation of animal rights.

The animals should be free to play in the jungle. But the argument for "free range" meat confuses me. Let the chickens out of their cages so that they can have a happy free life on the farm running around and eating bugs then kill them? You are just giving them the illusion of a happy life until they are fat and then you take it away. It would be unethical to eat free range meat. It's more humane to eat unhappy chickens that were brought up in cages because those animals weren't fooled and their death for my dinner plate may have been the quick end they were looking forward to.

What about Vegans? Who gets that? The first time I heard it I thought it had something to do with Star Trek because I knew Spock was a Vulcan and maybe the Vegans lived nearby. Some of our breakfasts are Vegan but I'm not sure which. At least the Vegans know what to eat so that is all that counts I guess.

Yet another class of vegetarians will eat fish. That is because fish are the vegetables of the sea. I can see that too. Zooplankton, Phytoplankton, you need a microscope to spy out the little patches of chloroform.

But it's the fourth kind of vegetarian that I really understand. "Faux Vegetarian" that's me. When I sit down at a table and they are serving frog's legs, steak tartar, or any of the various animal guts like gizzards or chicken hearts or even pig's feet then I remark at how delicious it all looks and how sorry I am that I can't enjoy their repast because I'm a vegetarian. But it's a different story when someone serves me some aged angus filet mignon or black forest ham then suddenly I'm an omnivore. So when I'm hungry and the food looks good all my confusion drops away.

Bed and Breakfast Blogs

I normally search on the internet for other blogs written by bed and breakfast owners. You can see some of the ones I like in the blog roll on the side panel of this website. The thing I notice in most of those blogs are how they promote the bed and breakfast which they own (makes sense -- I do it too) and they also talk about all the cool activities in their area and the "happenings". But the majority of them don't mention anything else. I want to hear some personal stuff so that I can get a feel for their lives as innkeepers. What about their pets? I want to know about their crazy Aunt Mabel who only visits during high season and won't leave (it happens -- a lot when you own a guest house).

Look at the list of featured blogs here: featured blogs on I love inns and you will see what I mean. Their blogs are all great. You will read about events that are featured near the inn's blog. Or perhaps about vacation specials this week (last minute savings etc). All the basic public relations and local information you could ever want. I want more...

Why do these other newsy blogs bother me? It's all about the blogosphere. I want to make a vast network of informative links between different bed and breakfast blogs featuring eclectic writings and just interesting stuff. Stuff we all want to read about.

So any of you out there that know about other innkeepers who are writing blogs that you find interesting please, please shoot me an email or make a comment here with the URL.

Blogging Often? I'd Rather be Biking

Blogging authorities agree -- a weekly blog post (some say daily) is the only way to keep your readers coming back for more. But there's so many things vying for my attention. It's high season at the rainforest inn. All our villas are booked with no vacancies in sight. The calendar looks all red with the marking tape we use to show bookings. We are now using an internet booking calendar which is saving some time.  I don't have to answer as many calls from guests wanting to stay nights that we're already booked because they can check the calendar themselves. We are also looking into a call answering service that will take messages and take bookings those times when we can't answer the phone. So what am I doing with all the extra time?

  This is a picture of my bike, taken this morning, leaning up against the sign just up the road from our entrance. I love to bike up that road in the morning. The rainforest is densely packed green vegetation on each side and the trees grow over and shade the road. There are stands of bamboo that move in the early morning breeze making spooky sounds. Two bridge crossings go over the headwaters of the Espiritu Santo river with lovely waterfalls on the south side of the bridge and an expansive view down the mountain to the north. After that early morning ride I always feel more full of energy and more able to deal with another day of not enough time (to blog). I have an extra bike and often ask my guests if they're interested in joining me for the ride up the road but no one has yet taken me up on the offer. I recommend highly for anyone else who finds themselves with too much on their calendar and no free time to take off in the early morning for a brisk 45 minutes of enjoyable aerobic exercise. It is not lost time. 

Mistaken identity

This morning I slept in too late to ride my bike before helping Laurie deliver the breakfasts (we serve breakfast at 9 am so I had no excuse). I was walking around, a little groggy from sleep, and kept hearing someone hammering in the background. There was also a bird squaking (a parrot?) but the hammering sound came from a different direction like someone working upstairs. I didn't really think about it because, if I had, I would have realized that there wasn't anyone upstairs 'cause we never do any work on the inn when there are guests staying.

When I walked up the driveway to open the gate the hammering sound got louder. We have two gates. The main gate is a mile down the mountain and it has an access control automatic system that calls my cell phone so I can beep someone in but our second gate is just above the parking and I haven't installed a gate opener in it yet. I kind of enjoy the quiet late evenings and early mornings when I walk up there to push the heavy gate aside on its steel rollers. The walk up the driveway also helps wake me up because I realized that the hammering sound had to be a woodpecker. He was really going at it. Pounding away furiously in small branch coming off the palma rosa tree in the dense brush there. Bits of wood fibers and sawdust were spewing to each side. I wish I could have gotten a video to post here but by the time I got the camera changed to video he flew off. He came back the next day but when I snuck up with the camera that time he must have already talked to his agent because at the first sight of the lens he took off again. I will keep trying though because he looks cool going at it with his hard beak and the hammering sound is so loud.

Who’s Who at the Rainforest Inn

Hi. My name is Pedro. I’m writing Bill’s Bed and Breakfast blog this week because Bill is busy entertaining visiting relatives in addition to running the inn during peak season and opening up a new five bedroom villa. I’ve been living here at the El Yunque Rainforest Inn for about eight months now.

This is the first time I’ve had the chance to hang out “behind the scenes” at a B&B guest house and it has been very interesting. Small places like this get their personality from the owners and Bill & Laurie certainly have some personalities. Bill is from the west coast and Laurie is from the east coast. Bill grew up in a large family which raised their children absolutely laissez-faire. He basically did whatever he wished with no adult supervision. He has stories about inventions he made as a child (one of which blew up his bed). Laurie, on the other hand, grew up in a strict organized environment working as a very young girl in her parent’s business. So you can imagine that they don’t always agree about how to run the bed and breakfast. Bill is busy running his ship’s agency which leaves Laurie in charge at the inn. But Bill still has time to interject free-style inconsistencies which keep things interesting.

I want to tell you about the girls, my favorite subject. Lizzy is a platinum blonde beauty. She has been with Bill & Laurie the longest. Although she is popular with the guests she proved her unreliability last year in a spectacular fashion. She took a hiatus (without either Bill or Laurie’s approval) for nine months. I worried about her whereabouts all that time but remembered also that the workers are often not on time and have been known to take off from a job sometimes for weeks without notice. In Puerto Rico it is more important to stop and help someone who is in need then to be on time for a job. Lizzy came back very nonchalantly one day after her vacation with some excuse about how she was kidnapped. Laurie was relieved to see her again but by that time she had transfered much of her affection to Bella, one of the younger girls (but not the youngest). Bella is always a real angel around here, a little prissy and whinny and not as popular with everyone like Lizzy (the blond) but admired for her extreme (and completely self aware) cuteness. Sometimes Bella will show up in the kitchen wearing some boutique get-up that only her and Laurie can appreciate.

The newest girl is Maya. She has only been here a short while but acts like she owns the place. She leaves her belongings out in the public areas for the rest of us to pick up. She doesn’t know how to behave around guests. She is usually being disciplined by Laurie and always forgiven by Bill. She thinks she is the one in charge and often pretends to supervise. She is into everyone’s business. She tries to make sure that everyone is where their supposed to be and lets us know if someone shows up unexpectedly. Sometimes she reminds me of an SS officer on patrol of the rainforest perimeter.

I hang out in the kitchen which is the center of the bed and breakfast. I am probably the one who spends the most time with Laurie as she not only prepares the incredible gourmet meals here but also all the rest of the meals for the volunteers. One of the guests took pictures of me because I’m a real Puerto Rican. I felt like the native Americans must feel when tourists photograph them as if they were part of the scenery. I was reluctant but Bill assured me that it would do no harm and that my photo would end up on an interesting web site and anyway it would only take a few minutes. Well, a few minutes turned into hours. I was never quit sure what was expected of me because the photographer and I didn’t speak the same language. After that everyone was “where’s Pedro”? I had disappeared for a couple of days to let them know what I thought of that whole deal. This island is full of Pedros like me and please guys choose someone else next time. After I returned Laurie assured me that I would never have to do that again. So now I’m back with my favorite girls and in my place of honor in the kitchen.

You may have guessed by now that Lizzy is an eleven-year-old silky terrier mix, Bella is a four-year-old mini Yorkshire terrier and Maya is a one-year-old Belgian Malanois. But did you figure out that I’m not who I seem to be? I am the resident coqui who lives in a crystal vase in Laurie’s kitchen. You can read about me in an earlier post and see pictures of me in my vase.

Oh! Don’t let me forget to mention Heather my newest favorite volunteer who sports a drawn on Luigi mustache sometimes to liven up the kitchen work place. And she’s a "Real" girl.

Thank you Bill for letting me do the blog -- Pedro, aka Laurie.

Building a Green Hotel -- the Practical Method

During our day to day operations and new construction we have done our best to harm the environment as little as possible. We aren't the only bed and breakfast to incorporate or try to incorporate green methods. It is very popular now to be green. But sometimes being green is not very practical. I'm going to list some of our efforts and explain why we have chosen them over some of the less practical green construction options there out there.

There is a TV show about an Inn in Africa called "Life is Wild". The show is about a Brady-Bunch type of family which moved to Africa to get in touch with each other while starting over as inn-keepers. If you watch the first couple of episodes you will see that there is some "bed and breakfast" stuff thrown in that is actually more true to life than often depicted in other television shows. Another example is the Tori Spelling show. It is a reality show about running a bed and breakfast but it is completely off base because the guests of the Tori Spelling place are only there in the hopes of being on TV and the operations are a dead loss as the profit center of that place is the TV show. Both of these new TV shows throw in lots of references to "green" construction, "green" paint and other environmentally friendly devices sometimes as a source of humor.

Also there are blogs like mine that discus the popular "greening" of bed and breakfasts. Wendy's Bed and Breakfast Blog is an example. If you want to learn about some of the work that needs to be done to make a house into an Inn you can read about it in her excellent blog. Wendy is also trying to make her new place "green" in an honest effort to try to save the environment as best as one person can do while still surviving. Green Hotels and Inns are trendy.

Five years ago when we started renovating the hurricane ravaged estate that was to be the rainforestinn we weren't thinking about green construction. We were mainly thinking about how we would ever be able to accomplish such a huge task with the limited resources that we could scramble together (mainly just our wits and a little brawn). We ended up recycling building materials because it was cheaper to use all the piles of lumber, fancy antique bathroom fixtures, twisted used copper pipe and other materials that were left over from the destroyed main house. We learned as we went along what was practical to recycle and what we were better off purchasing new. The old cedar was begging to be re-cycled. The ubiquitous rainforest termites had done us the favor of cleaning the sapwood off which left just the prime quarter-sawn heart wood boards for us to sand to bare wood and varnish again before I used them to make the new high vaulted ceiling-roof for the villa. The antique bathroom fixtures, like the claw foot bath tub, were worth all the effort making weird old fittings fit to modern plumbing. We learned something about toilets though. The bowl of a modern toilet is molded so that the gallon of water (less when trying to be green and water saving) actually flushes all the stuff down in one swoosh. So we used the antique backs (which matched the sinks) and put them on modern toilet bowls. For our newest bathrooms we bought toilets which can be flushed "a little" or "a lot" depending on what you're flushing down.

The most important thing we learned about being green is that you have to know quit a bit about construction to do it in a practical manner. We collect rainwater for all our water needs. We learned that the best way to pressurize the water is to use a well pump in the cistern and fool it into thinking it's in a well by using a ten inch diameter PVC pipe to install it in. In any case always use a submersible pump as they are the most efficient (you use less electricity -- also being green) and they are quiet. We are even building our pool system with the pump house below the pool level so that we can use a quiet submersible pump. But is it really being green to collect rainwater, store it in cisterns and pump it using electricity for the necessary pressure? Perhaps if we build a windmill for the electricity it will then really be green.

Separating grey water is a good idea too especially if you have some gardens to water with it. It is a very bad idea to mix your gray water into the rainwater collecting cisterns as it is hard enough already to keep those sterile (we use a little chlorine once in a while which even in very small amounts kills the deadliest amoebas instantly). If you use the right detergents in your laundry (lots of phosphates) the gardens will bloom magnificently from the gray water irrigation. Using a detergent with lots of phosphates will also make your bed sheets much cleaner. Stay away from "green" detergents as they are expensive and don't clean as well. If you aren't connected to a sewage line where the phosphates would wash into the sea and cause algae bloom then you don't need to worry about phosphates.

Using solar heat is a very practical green method especially with the new vacuum tube solar heaters. They are very efficient and used in conjunction with a demand heater (for the times when every guest is showering at once) they will actually pay for themselves too.

Outdoor lighting is best done with LED lamps powered with small batteries charged by solar cells. They are cheap. They work well and you don't have to run wires all over the place. Also replace all your incandescent bulbs with the new energy saving ones even if they are expensive and sometimes buzz loudly.

By all means put compost buckets in all the guest's rooms. It will cut your garbage generation in half as well as help you build lots of new rich soil for your garden. They also make it easier to keep animals out of your garbage as there won't be anything interesting for them to root out. Separate cans for paper, plastics, and aluminum are also a good idea.

Those are pretty much all the practical green methods that we have proven out here. I have heard of some other things to try but most of them are very "gimmicky". Don't waste any money on "green" paints as they are just latex based paint that can be purchased at better quality and lower price without the "green" label. It is also very difficult to make a light colored paint without using titanium dioxide and it is impossible to make a long-lasting paint without adding a little fungicide. Of course the low-cost recycled paints are fine.

Please if anybody has any other suggestions for cost-effective green strategies please let me know.

Nature Photography at the Rainforest Inn

We have a coqui named Pedro who lives in a glass jar in our "farm house" kitchen near the sink. There are also coquis everywhere, under leaves in the garden, in the trees, hanging out in the heliconias but even with our over-abundance of coquis sometimes one of our guests wants to see a coqui and can't seem to find one for a photo or a quick look. Following the sound of the coquis outside is deceptively difficult because their call is loud and echos so that you're never really sure what leaf to look under or even what tree the coqui may be coming in.

Our Three King's day present was the return of Pedro the coqui. We saw him right back in his jar on the kitchen counter just to the right of my Pavoni.

We thought we had lost him just before Christmas when a guest staying with us who is a professional photographer needed a subject in the short hours before he had to return home to catch his flight. We set up a banana leaf and a yagrumo leaf on the big mahogany table in the kitchen and Steve took many pictures, using a flash, and from all angles. Pedro didn't seem to mind but when I put him back near his jar he hid out for several weeks and we didn't see him again until three king's day. You can go to Scott Kilgore's web site to see some of his excellent nature photographs and perhaps soon one of the pictures he took of Pedro -- our kitchen coqui.

Raising a dog to be a proper B&B assistant

We were spoiled by our old German Shephard "Addie". The guests all loved her. She was friendly to everyone but still knew how to be a guard dog and would protect Laurie when she went on her long walks on deserted beaches. It's difficult for a naturally protective shepherd to learn that the strangers who come into our home so quickly and for such short times are honored guests that she should welcome into her "pack" but she made the distinction and would still bark when someone was at the gate who wasn't supposed to be there. She was very "in tune" to our feelings.

She was highly trained (having won obedience trials) and the dog that I had taken everywhere with me including on board the trading vessels I worked with before we opened our bed and breakfast. So she knew what work was all about and how to greet people respectfully and when a guest was a dog lover and she could bask in their attention happily; or when a guest that wasn't so much a dog person she knew how to be admired from a distance. Being a good bed and breakfast dog is a fairly hard job for a naturally protective pack animal.

Our new dog is also a shephard but this time we decided on a Belgian Malinois because they are just as smart and trainable as German Shepards but the breed is also known to have fewer hip problems and be longer lived. I had decided on a Malanois a couple of years ago but the recommended breeders that I could find were charging over a $1000 for the dogs and with shipping that would have been quit an investment so I was waiting for exactly the right puppy.

Laurie (my wife and the boss lady of our bed and breakfast) also knew how much I wanted a Belgian and she was looking around too and luckily found the perfect dog. The big Navy base here in Puerto Rico (the one that had the practice range on the island of Vieques) closed about four years ago under pressure from local activists and the K9 outfit on the base was breeding some Belgian Malinois for war dog training. These dogs had no AKC registration and were not part of an "official" military program so the relocating base personal had to find new homes for them. The bitch, which was the mother of our new puppy, ended up being given to a local base contractor and he raised her welp of puppies for sale. My wife found out about the puppies being for sale and suggested I go check them out. I was amazed to find out what incredible dogs they were. The bitch was a tremendous alpha dog that wouldn't let a stranger within ten feet of her. She, and the puppies, had perfect confirmation and I picked out the best female puppy in the litter feeling very lucky to get such an incredible dog on the island. Local breeders tend to specialize in smaller dogs.

We raised our puppy using the methods outlined by the Monks of New Skete. She stayed in a crate right by my bed and I took her everywhere I went on a leash (including to the docks of San Juan where I work as a ship's agent). She was always a big hit with the ship Captains and the stevedores. Gradually we taught Maya basic obedience training. Laurie went on long walks down our driveway (about a mile each way) and taught her to heel. Maya proved to be easy to train and had very good behavior. Even in her puppy phase she didn't wreck too many things and picked-up right away what was "her toys" and never to chew on U.S. Customs papers (except once). But Maya is an "alpha" dog so we have to keep after her behavior.

When new guests arrive, after check-in and complementary pina colada, I usually lead Maya out to great the guests. I tell Maya to sit while she is being petted and discipline her if she paws them or jumps up. Occasionally we get guests who don't like animals (or dogs anyway) and then it is harder. I have to train Maya to lie down and not molest those guests. Maya hasn't figured that out yet and keeps a very wary eye on the guests that don't want anything to do with her. My biggest worry is that she will growl or act menacing towards a guest that surprises her walking down a driveway or by coming in the property from our jungle paths. The training is coming along though and as she gets older she is learning to keep her territorial instincts in check.

I wanted to include a you tube video of what Maya does when someone gets near her food bowl but I decided that it was a little too scary. We are also working with her on that. I put a food bowl down and then tell her to sit and not touch it while I pick it up again. If she growls then she is told "no" and not given her food back until she sits quietly. This is fairly advanced training as most people know better than to touch a dog that is eating but just in case we want her to have perfect "nice" behavior in all situations. A good bed and breakfast dog is a special animal.

Bird Watching in El Yunque

I was just looking through the guest registry for the villa. Our guests write wonderful comments about their stay. Some even put drawings in the guest book. One drawing I'm including in this blog is of one of Laurie's flower arrangements. This flower arrangement was on the breakfast table on the villa porch and one of our guests presented us with a watercolor of it.

We have many guests who come here for the bird watching. A recent guest made the following list of birds she confirmed siting while staying in our El Yunque hideaway. If you go out on the island, of course, you may see many more but these were birds that visited our bed and breakfast:

Red Tailed Hawk (Guaraguao)
Mangrove Cuckoo
Puerto Rican Lizard-Cuckoo (Coccyzus vieilloti)
Puerto Rican Woodpecker
Scaly-naped Pigeon (Patagioenas squamosa)
White-winged Dove (Zenaida asiatica)
Green Mango: [Anthracothorax viridis] hummingbird
Puerto Rican Emerald
Puerto Rican Tody (San Pedrito)
Gray Kingbird
Pearly-Eyed Thrasher
Red legged Thrush
Bananaquit (Coereba flaveola)
Cape May Warbler
Black Throated blue warbler
Black-Cowled Oriole
Shiny Cowbird
Striped Headed Tanager
Antillean Euphonea
Indigo Bunting
Black-faced Grassquit (Tiaris bicolor)
Black Whiskered Vireo

My favorite is the Lizard Cuckoo both for it's long elegant striped tail and for the cool sound it makes. I also love listening to the Puerto Rican screech owls at night as their call added to the night sounds makes it seem like a Tarzan movie sound track.

This photo is of a green heron that one of guests saw hiking off of our property. We have a path that leads to an isolated pool at the top (right at the top with an incredible view) of the Espiritu Santo waterfall. We have this photo because none of us could identify it at the time so our guests emailed it to us for identification. I always thought of herons as sea coast birds.